Blind Item Revealed: Here's the Broadcast Drama Kicking Off Its New Season With a Major Time Jump

TVLine readers have logged their guesses about our most recent Blind Item, involving a long-running broadcast-TV drama that plans to open its new season with a significant time jump. And if you thought NBC’s The Blacklist might fit that description, you would be correct.

As TVLine can now reveal, the James Spader-led crime drama will kick off Season 9 with a two-year leap forward, picking up well after Elizabeth Keen’s sudden death via gunshot wound in the Season 8 finale. What’s more, the NBC series’ return will find the FBI task force disbanded in the wake of Liz’s murder, with their lives now changed in unexpected ways and Raymond Reddington’s whereabouts unknown.

“Finding themselves each at a crossroads, a common purpose compels them to renew their original mission: to take down dangerous, vicious and eccentric Blacklisters,” the official Season 9 synopsis reads. “In the process, they begin to uncover lethal adversaries, unimaginable conspiracies and surprising betrayals that will threaten alliances and spur vengeance for the past, led by the most devious criminal of them all – Raymond Reddington.”

The Blacklist‘s time jump comes on the heels of leading lady Megan Boone exiting the show at the end of Season 8, followed by series creator Jon Bokenkamp’s departure from the drama one day after the finale aired.

“I love this show with all of my heart, and it’s been an incredible journey, but after eight years I feel it’s time for me to step out of my comfort zone, try something new, and explore a few of the other characters and stories that have been crawling around in my head,” Bokenkamp wrote to fans at the time. “I genuinely believe the series remains full of life, creatively strong, and that bright days lie ahead.”

The Blacklist returns for its ninth — and potentially final — season on Thursday, Oct. 21 at 8/7c. In addition to Spader, returning cast members include Diego Klattenhoff as Agent Ressler, Amir Arison as Aram Mojtabai, Hisham Tawfiq as Dembe, Laura Sohn as Agent Park and Harry Lennix as Harold Cooper.

Was The Blacklist your guess for our latest Blind Item? Tell us below!

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